


Look Right, Look Left

by BelaBellissima



Series: Lady Lazarus [1]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, Under the Red Hood
Genre: #halloweencontentwar, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Brother-Sister Relationships, Dead Robins Club, Gen, I will fight people over those because they are great, Platonic Forehead Kisses, Resurrection, canon torture, digging out of your own grave, it's pretty brief but still look out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-28
Updated: 2017-10-28
Packaged: 2019-01-21 20:24:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12465260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BelaBellissima/pseuds/BelaBellissima
Summary: Steph wakes up.





	Look Right, Look Left

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Forget you I will not (my fellow dead Robin).](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9072673) by [youngjusticewriter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/youngjusticewriter/pseuds/youngjusticewriter). 



> Title from "A Better Resurrection" by Sylvia Plath  
> Written for Day 4 of the Halloween content war. The prompt was Zombies.
> 
> Go read the work that inspired this!!!! It's amazing and I love it a lot!

Steph wakes up to darkness. It’s the kind of dark that Gotham usually doesn’t ever see, even with the perpetual cloud cover and rain. The big city always has some amount of lights on, and the streets remain full of cars until well after midnight. But this? This is pitch black.

As black as death.

As black as _him._

The Black Mask, Roman Sionis, proud member of the “I Killed A Robin” club.

The man who tortured her for days, who took a power drill to her and pulled out nails and a tooth or two. Who took a pair of garden shears to her left foot and a hair straightener to her fingers. Who left her hanging by her wrists from the ceiling until her arms were nearly pulled from their sockets. Who probably did more that she can’t remember during the times that she was unconscious from the pain. Who killed her.

She had died, she remembers. She had finally been rescued, finally been deemed important enough to be looked for, but it was too late. Leslie’s new treatment didn’t work, and she died only minutes after Bruce told her she was Robin, that it was never about hurting Tim.

That she truly mattered.

She remembers wondering in that moment if that was what it was like to have a father that actually cared. Arthur had never cared, that was for sure, not unless it benefitted him in some way. Steph can remember a few times when Arthur faked it just enough to get his way.

But then, if all of that happened, if she really had died, then where was she now? She’d always imagined that if an afterlife existed, it would be more than just never-ending darkness.

Maybe she’s somewhere in the cave? Maybe it’s only been a few minutes since she died, and Bruce somehow managed to start her heart again, but the lack of oxygen for those few minutes caused her to go blind? But… she can’t hear any bats, or the faint laps of water from where tiny little two-inch waves hit against the hull of the Batsub. She can’t hear the whir of the Batcomputer.

She’d always been able to hear those even with her sight – shouldn’t she now hear them even more clearly?

Her brain finally registers the sound of her breathing, but it’s more than just that – she can feel how her breaths are hitting something close enough to her face for the heat to bounce off of it and back on to her.

Steph tries to bring her hands to her face but they hit something right above her, no more than four or five inches above her stomach. It’s padded so it doesn’t hurt, but it does surprise her.

She presses her fingers into it as best she can, feeling out the seams. Spreading her hands to either side, she feels the ceiling drop down around her only a few inches to each side of her hips.

She’s in a box.

A padded, comfortable, stale smelling box.

There’s a pillow under her head, she realizes. She turns her head back and forth, right and left, trying to get _any_ clue as to what this is, because she has a suspicion but she’s begging anything listening that she’s wrong.

She can feel old makeup on her cheeks, the liquid foundation kind that always looks too cakey on her so she never wears it, and especially not in costume.

She’s not in her costume anymore either. She realizes belatedly that her hands are void of gloves and her neck is free of her mask and the slightly-too-tight tie of her cape. Instead of boots, she’s in ballet flats.

She shifts her body a little and feels how the cushion she’s laying on is slightly sunk in from the constant pressure of her body.

She really did die.

She’s been _buried._

_Fuck._

Steph starts to breathe faster and pulls her arms into her chest.

She _won’t_ die again, especially not buried underground where she can’t even get one last glimpse of the city that raised her.

 _This is going to hurt_ , she thinks, because she doesn’t know if she’ll actually be able to speak right now, and punches the top of the coffin. Her fist rips through the satin cloth easily enough, her right hook still in top shape despite now belonging to a dead girl. Undead girl? Zombie girl? She shakes her head slightly; the wooden top of the coffin doesn’t so much as budge.

She punches again. She hears a crack and then there’s pain in her fingers, causing her to release a little cry of surprise. Clenching her fist, she does her best to ignore her broken fingers and punches the top again, another cry wrenched from her lips at the impact.

She can feel a few splinters stick into her knuckles, and when she runs the pads of her finger tips where she’d just punched, she feels nothing to indicate she’d been trying at all.

She punches again. Wetness trickles down her shaking hand and wrist. She could scream in frustration, she realizes.

She thinks she does the next time she punches the lid.

 _No!_ she shouts at herself, refusing to give in, and punches again. The wood finally cracks just enough for a few little clumps of dirt to fall onto her chest.

Her breaths are starting to become harder to take. Her heart is beating twice as fast as usual, and Steph realizes that there are tears streaming from her eyes.

She punches the lid one more time, and a little more dirt falls, landing in her mouth. She chokes, not expecting it. Coughing hurts more than the punching does, and she realizes she’s started shouting the next time she punches the lid. She can’t die here, she won’t – she has to get to her mom and to Tim and to Bruce who’s already had to bury a son and now a daughter. She has to get out and tell them not to worry because she’s okay – well, not _okay,_ but she’s breathing.

She goes to punch the coffin one more time, but the lid is suddenly gone.

Her hand hits empty air, and she opens her eyes.

Above her, she can see clouds, dark and grey as they block out the stars and the moon. They’re mostly smog and pollution, not real clouds full of water, but it’s one of the most beautiful things she thinks she’s ever seen. Off in the distance she can make out the vague shape of the Batsignal lighting up a portion of the sky.

Above her is a boy.

He looks familiar.

He’s got black hair and blue eyes, a carbon copy of Tim and Dick and Bruce, but there’s a white streak at his forehead and a green outline to the iris’s. He’s wearing a brown leather jacket, and Steph shivers looking at it. The cold air and the plain clothes she’s been dressed in don’t mix well.

 _Who are you?_ She tries to ask. No words come out, just a gasp and a wheeze of air, a moan of panic or fear or distress that makes the boy’s face contort into one of understanding. He’s got a shovel in his hands but drops it in an instant, reaching down for her.

His arms scoop her up from where she’s still laying in the coffin, pulling her into a seated position. She’s leaning against him and still crying, because she’s just so _confused_. She grips at the leather jacket, her swollen and broken fingers curling around it as best as she can.

“You’re safe now, Stephanie,” he whispers into her hair, and Steph doesn’t really know why but she believes him. “I’ve got you. You’re not alone. I won’t let you be alone. Never again.”

She closes her eyes and leans fully into his chest, burying her face into the collar of the jacket.

“I’m so sorry this happened to you,” he continues. Steph wonders if he’s doing it on purpose to comfort her or just running his mouth, unaware because he’s too high strung at her resurrecting to realize the exact words he’s murmuring. “It shouldn’t have happened to anyone else. I should’ve been the last.”

He swears under his breath and holds her just little tighter. Steph realizes with nauseating clarity who he is. She tries multiple times to speak, but all that comes out is a whisper.

“Jason,” her voice could be just a soft breeze for how soft it is, but she continues anyway, forcing the words to come out. “Thank you.”

He loosens his grip on her just enough to shift and get his feet underneath himself. Pulling her more into a bridal-style carry, he rises and lifts her out of the six-foot hole in the ground. The moment he pulls himself out of the grave after her she’s back in his arms. He carries her so gently she can barely tell they’re moving.

There’s a car waiting a few yards away – old and beat up, not something Steph would usually trust at all, but its warm inside once Jason turns on the heater and wraps her in a blanket. She looks at him. She’s not sure what it is he sees in her, but he smiles sadly and presses his lips to her forehead. Steph’s almost painfully reminded of Dick, of how he did that to her after her first patrol as Robin. It warms her more than the heater.

“It was no trouble, little sis. Us even numbered Robins got to stick together after all, right?”

He closes the door to the passenger side of the car before moving out of sight. She’s alone for a few minutes, presumably while he refills her grave with dirt.

The driver’s side door opening makes her flinch in surprise, but it’s still a relief to see him again. As he starts the engine then drives them away, Steph’s eyes close of their own accord, and she drifts off into unconsciousness.

She knows she doesn’t have to worry with Jason there.

He’ll take care of her.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on [tumblr!](https://belabellissima.tumblr.com/)


End file.
